Hayden Ad Attacks ‘Special Interest State’ : Politics: Democratic assemblyman calls for the public’s help in bringing about legislative reform.

Assemblyman Tom Hayden on Wednesday purchased a full-page advertisement in the Western edition of the New York Times to complain that California has become the “special interest state” and to launch what he said was a drive for public help in achieving political reform.

The Santa Monica Democrat, who entered politics as a 1960s radical, said that in the decade he has served in the Legislature “a decisive change happened” that has “locked the individual voter and small contributor out of the process.”

Snatching a favorite theme of ex-Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr.’s recent presidential campaign, the Hayden ad urges people to make government work again “by taking back our state from the special interests.”

Instead of a toll-free telephone number, the ad includes a coupon that can be sent to Hayden to register interest in supporting his reform agenda, including campaign finance limits. Hayden, who helped start the grass-roots political organization Campaign California, said he is not launching a new group.

But it is not unusual for Hayden to strike out on his own. Hayden has stayed aloof from many of his colleagues, often skirting the Legislature to mount initiative campaigns. He and Campaign California were instrumental in passage of Proposition 65, the anti-toxic initiative, as well as the failed environmental measure known as Big Green.

Some of the themes in the ad are the same that Hayden used in his successful June primary victory in the 23rd Senate District, which straddles West Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley. In that contest, Hayden spent $597,000 of his own money.

A Hayden spokesman said the lawmaker spent about $2,000 of his own money on the advertisement, which does not identify the five-term lawmaker as a state legislator.

The ad features a photograph of a white napkin from Frank Fat’s restaurant near the Capitol on which special interests drafted a 1987 bill that became a law protecting private industry and individuals from personal injury lawsuits. Above the picture is the headline: “How This Meal Fed California’s Budget Crisis.”

In his ad, Hayden brands the measure as “a cynical deal” for which the special interest lobbyists have rewarded lawmakers, partly through campaign contributions. The ad suggests that the same special interests are responsible for the ongoing budget crisis.

“Let’s teach the special interests some table manners. They shouldn’t write laws on napkins--but use them to wipe up the mess,” the ad concludes.

Reaction in the Capitol was mixed. Some colleagues were amused. Others suggested that the ad signaled a renewed interest by Hayden, who ran for the U.S. Senate in 1976, to seek statewide office. Still others attacked the ad for hurting the state’s business climate.

Franz Wisner, a spokesman for Gov. Pete Wilson, dismissed the advertisement as “typical campaign rhetoric” and described Hayden’s proposals to close tax loopholes for businesses as “a prescription for disaster.”